Thousands enjoy closed roads during Houston's pilot program

By Jayme Fraser |
April 6, 2014
| Updated: April 6, 2014 3:52pm

Until the day warmed up and rain moved on, few people attended the City of Houston's Sunday Streets event, which closed a more than two mile stretch of White Oak and Quitman to vehicle traffic for four hours. By 1 pm, officials reported more than 2,000 people filled the street.

Juan, Andres and Maricela Alvarado pedaled faster and swerved from the yellow line of Quitman Street toward a puddle at the corner of Chestnut, screaming and laughing as the water splashed and soaked their jeans.

The siblings - ages 9 and 11 - turned around and raced back onto Quitman without stopping to look for cars. On Sunday, they didn't have to.

The City of Houston closed a 2.5-mile stretch of Quitman and White Oak to motor vehicles for four hours on Sunday, encouraging Houstonians to play in the street and explore their neighborhoods, pushing strollers or riding bikes rather than steering minivans or sports cars.

It was the first closure in the Sunday Streets HTX pilot program, which will close stretches of major thoroughfares the first Sunday of every month. Free DJs, Zumba classes, a farmers market and photo booth lined the street, but unlike a street festival, the options were spread out and, for the most part, offered by neighborhood businesses rather than vendors who set up shop. One of the core goals, after all, is to get people moving, said Laura Spanjian, the city's director of sustainability.

"We want people to get out and exercise and bike and walk and skate, and really enjoy the open space," Spanjian said, standing in the middle of White Oak Drive near Houston Avenue. "It's also to have people enjoy the street in a way they aren't able to most of the time, to see things they might not get to see because they're driving by in their cars."

Despite intermittent rain in the first two hours of the event, police, who were guiding traffic away from the street, reported at 1 p.m. that they had counted 2,000 people at the event so far.

The next Sunday Streets event will be along Westheimer between Hazard and Yoakum from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. on May 4.